Putin menaces to target Kyiv with intermediate-range ballistic missiles and commends Trump. Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned of a potential strike on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, using the recently introduced Oreshnik missiles, while he lauded US President-elect Donald Trump as “quite astute and seasoned. ”
“We do not rule out the deployment of Oreshnik against military installations, defense industry sites, or the decision-making centers, including in Kyiv,” Putin stated at a press conference in Kazakhstan on Thursday.
The Oreshnik missile, utilized for the first time against Ukraine last week, is equipped with six warheads and can travel at ten times the speed of sound, as per Putin, who additionally asserted that it is impervious to any contemporary air defense systems.
The employment of multiple Oreshnik missiles in a single assault would be comparable in its destructive capacity to that of a nuclear device, he remarked.
The Oreshnik can breach subterranean bunkers and disperse numerous submunitions that “reduce everything to dust,” Putin stated at the summit in Kazakhstan of a security alliance of former Soviet republics.
"Although Oreshnik is certainly not a weapon of mass destruction,” Putin added.
The Russian leader insinuated that the US's decision to permit Ukraine to attack Russia with longer-range missiles might aim to complicate the next US administration's ability to broker a peace agreement.
He praised incoming US President Donald Trump as a “shrewd and seasoned” leader, expressing confidence in his ability to devise a solution given that he “has confronted such a challenge as reclaiming the White House. ”
Trump has previously asserted he could conclude the conflict in Ukraine “in a single day,” yet some individuals who have fled the country remain skeptical about the future.